sonar5pe or cubase sx3 which and why?

[Hunter]

Sonar is a good host, been using it since 3, there are a frew annoying bugs but what host doesn't have them.

The standard of plugins is superb, PentagonI, and Perfect space, v-vocal, lexicon pantheon, the sonitus suite, and loads more, really impressive. my only experience of cubase effects has been its 'reverb' so maybe I'm biased

Once the automation envelopes work SOnar will be perfecto for me.

[grymmjack]

I know that steinbergs VST implementation is 100% dead-on, as they /invented/ VST.

...actually, for a long time, they kept changing their hidden host-side spec to suit functionality they rolled into their own commercial synths... that's hardly 'dead-on' if they have to modify the host to suit new functionality.

That does not surprise me considering the complexity has grown over time. I did not know this though. Thanks now I have slightly less confidence in steinberger

Here is a stupid question; since steinberg invented VST/ASIO and opened it up via SDK and so forth (which are both great things!) long before any other standards were around (except for maybe the protools stuff), why hasn't an opensource-like standard been created? For example steinberg is the ultimate controling entity of the VST and ASIO technologies which other companies are bound by their ongoing decisions moving forward. Call me kooky, but it seems to me that a separate entity without any stakes in the bigger picture of software/hardware would be better suited to democratically steer this kind of stuff in the future?

Of course it's a ton of work and years of development, but save that, why hasn't this happened I wonder? DirectX and DXi are bound to microsoft (or is it cakewalk that invented DXi?) but atleast they dont have products (atleast not yet) that compete with that which those technologies support/were invented for!

[grymmjack]

the packaging is inferior though (each 3rd party plug is as-is, and not branded or consistent with the core app. this is an aspect of sonar that suffers when compared to cubase.

pfffffffffffffffffffft oh my god, its not as good because the plugins don't say 'Cakewalk' or 'Sonar5' on them?

No, Hunter. Actually the steinberg stuff doesn't say "steinberg" everywhere either (unless of course you click in certain areas of plugs with 'about/splash' pages) But it's funny how people interpret "brand" and "package" words in a synth/effect context. There is more to brand than a logo, there is more to package than a bullet list of inclusions. It's not just a logo, it's the entire way in which everything works and acts together.

Anyway

[whyterabbyt]

Here is a stupid question; since steinberg invented VST/ASIO and opened it up via SDK and so forth (which are both great things!) long before any other standards were around (except for maybe the protools stuff), why hasn't an opensource-like standard been created?

Firstly, as far as Im aware, DX precedes VST as an audio plugin standard.
Secondly, there already are 'open-source' standards, such as LADSPA.

Call me kooky, but it seems to me that a separate entity without any stakes in the bigger picture of software/hardware would be better suited to democratically steer this kind of stuff in the future?

Yes it would. But Steinberg don't appear to want that to happen, and VST is already entrenched enough that its unlikely to be replaced. However, there is a 'meta-API' (or plugin standard) which has been proposed and is being developed by the MIDI Manufacturer's Association. It would sit 'above' DX, AU or VST.

Of course it's a ton of work and years of development, but save that, why hasn't this happened I wonder?

I suspect its more likely that you're just unaware of what is happening.

[grymmjack]

Here is a stupid question; since steinberg invented VST/ASIO and opened it up via SDK and so forth (which are both great things!) long before any other standards were around (except for maybe the protools stuff), why hasn't an opensource-like standard been created?

Firstly, as far as Im aware, DX precedes VST as an audio plugin standard.
Secondly, there already are 'open-source' standards, such as LADSPA.

I thought LADSPA was for linux only at the moment (Linux Audio Developer's Simple Plugin API (LADSPA))?

Of course it's a ton of work and years of development, but save that, why hasn't this happened I wonder?

I suspect its more likely that you're just unaware of what is happening.

Very likely, and that is why I asked.

[headquest]

Regarding "brand" and "packaging", the Sonitus effects, Perfect Space, and the TTS-1 synth are all clearly branded with the Cakewalk logo in Sonar. PsynII, RXP, Groove Synth and V-Vocal all share the same general design look and a similar colour scheme as well, and clearly belong to the Sonar environment.

[whyterabbyt]

I thought LADSPA was for linux only at the moment (Linux Audio Developer's Simple Plugin API (LADSPA))?

You didnt say anything about platform, you just asked "why hasn't an opensource-like standard been created?"

They have. LADSPA is one. If you want to rephrase your question, please feel free to do so, but this time say what you actually mean please..

[Beardedone]

Sonar works for me simply because it was always easy to understand. It never gets in the way and allowed me to make music from the day one (I satrted with version 2). On the other hand, Cubase (from the earliest to lastest versions) have never worked for me. It seems that every single procedure was designed to be unintuitive and awkward. It's just me as I know many here love it. Whatever you do spend plenty of time demoing both.

[grymmjack]

I thought LADSPA was for linux only at the moment (Linux Audio Developer's Simple Plugin API (LADSPA))?

You didnt say anything about platform, you just asked "why hasn't an opensource-like standard been created?"

They have. LADSPA is one. If you want to rephrase your question, please feel free to do so, but this time say what you actually mean please..

Heh. nah, it's already been answered. Thanks

[Meffy]

Whatever you do spend plenty of time demoing both.

If what I've read is true, Steinberg doesn't provide a demo. :-( Which is pretty hard to believe, and unfair to themselves IMO. Some people who would have been happier with their software will get something else less suitable because they weren't given the opportunity to try Cubase out.

[Beardedone]

There were demos of SX and VST 5. I have tried later versions of SX on friends systems. Just for the record I am not talking about cracks.

[whyterabbyt]

"lowest CPU usage and cleanest sound" -- That is total fallacy and completely circumstantial.

I just noticed this. Can you explain how your standards of 'total fallacy' and 'completely circumstantial' gell with the kind of assertion you have been making yourself eg

Again, I feel it was fair to mention the sonar requirement of the bloated incomplete implementation that is the VST wrapper, and the lackluster performance I have had with their ASIO implementation.

Bloated? Lacklustre? Do you have a 'scientific or provable way' of backing this up?

Sonar does not have the lowest CPU usage, and it doesn't sound "cleaner or better", in any scientific or provable way than cubase or anything else. There are so many variables that you cannot possibly make that statement fairly or prove it.

[grymmjack]

"lowest CPU usage and cleanest sound" -- That is total fallacy and completely circumstantial.

I just noticed this. Can you explain how your standards of 'total fallacy' and 'completely circumstantial' gell with the kind of assertion you have been making yourself eg

Again, I feel it was fair to mention the sonar requirement of the bloated incomplete implementation that is the VST wrapper, and the lackluster performance I have had with their ASIO implementation.

Bloated? Lacklustre? Do you have a 'scientific or provable way' of backing this up?

Do I need to? Isn't it obvious? There is nothing magic happening to make something sound better or cleaner in any sequencer/host. Prove it? I can't but neither can anyone else, except for maybe the programmers of both softwares. And coming from them everyone will think they are biased anyway and take their word at face value.

I dont have the sourcecode so I can't walk it to look through it to see if truely it is transparent or there are any special tricks added anywhere in the signal flow. Even if I did I don't have the know-how regarding DSP or programming at that low level to recognize if it were. It's common sense I think to hope for transparency in a host that doesn't make any noise on it's own, as a benefit and any added character to the audio is a bad thing in this scope yes? For instruments, additional tonal character and so forth is good because it is an attribute of what defines the instrument for example, but not in a place where you want to gather such instruments to arrange their collective outputs, right? Are the hosts doing things behind our backs? I personally don't want any special processing unless I tell it to do so. So I honestly hope not.

As for bloat, the VST adapter is bloated because of the way it muddies things up with the registration/system level emulation of directx adpated VST->DX/VSTi->DXi's. It's just one more stupid hoop I have to jump through to take advantage of the excellent (many free) VST offerings available, and it annoys me to no end for I do not have to do this in other smaller hosts with less commercial backing. Yet the small-guys have much better ways to go about doing the same thing.

But still, I could go with the adapter and the hoop that comes with it as well, if it worked properly, but it doesn't work as well as the one offered natively in cubase. It's a waste of my time to maintain yet another cache of plugin information. It's a huge frustration and adds to the complexity that we deal with all the time fighting with the machine instead of making music with it. The adapter had failed on me more than it has succeeded for adapting instruments. Effects I had no problems with, though.

A better solution would be one that didn't require a system-level modification just to conform to the existing DirectX "fit" inside the Sonar programming. Something internal to sonar itself, like FLstudio with it's excellent wrapper, would be much better IMO, where we would not have to do anything besides point to a directory containing our plugs (like nearly every other app with VST support) and then let the app recursively scan and we pick from the "all systems go" list. As it stands, we have to run an external adapter. What bothers me more is that as a side-effect I have no way to disable the presence of an adapted plugin within other direct-x aware apps -- for example I do not want soundforge scanning and detecting certain plug-ins that I don't use inside of soundforge, etc. And I don't want to have to open the adapter and disable it before launching soundforge..

Lackluster is when the WDM kernel streaming mode performs better than the ASIO mode even though my card has native ASIO support which is lower latency. Why is this? I could not sort it out. I honestly change nothing on the card or in its settings, open cubase, and everything works fine. To me that experience is exactly lackluster; it works -- sorta.. mediocre performance. The ASIO mode in cubase works better for me on my system. Great performance.

The circumstantial bit is that we all have differing hardware and there is no perfect benchmark that I am aware of that could test such theories of one sounding better than the other. Identical hardware, identical software, and some metrics at the output stage to scientifically measure the aural characteristics I suppose is possible, but does such a study exist anywhere? Such a study performed without external commercial or industry-related influence, conducted by a nonpartisan entity? I've not seen one, perhaps you have?

[whyterabbyt]

Do I need to? Isn't it obvious?

In the light of your comments about 'fallacy' and 'scientific proof'? Yes.

There is nothing magic happening to make something sound better or cleaner in any sequencer/host. Prove it? I can't but neither can anyone else, except for maybe the programmers of both softwares. And coming from them everyone will think they are biased anyway and take their word at face value.

I dont have the sourcecode so I can't walk it to look through it to see if truely it is transparent or there are any special tricks added anywhere in the signal flow. Even if I did I don't have the know-how regarding DSP or programming at that low level to recognize if it were. It's common sense I think to hope for transparency in a host that doesn't make any noise on it's own, as a benefit and any added character to the audio is a bad thing in this scope yes? For instruments, additional tonal character and so forth is good because it is an attribute of what defines the instrument for example, but not in a place where you want to gather such instruments to arrange their collective outputs, right? Are the hosts doing things behind our backs? I personally don't want any special processing unless I tell it to do so. So I honestly hope not.

What exactly does that have to do with your own claims regarding 'bloat' et.c.

As for bloat, the VST adapter is bloated because of the way it muddies things up with the registration/system level emulation of directx adpated VST->DX/VSTi->DXi's.

That's far from the common meaning of 'bloated' regarding software.

It's just one more stupid hoop I have to jump through to take advantage of the excellent (many free) VST offerings available, and it annoys me to no end for I do not have to do this in other smaller hosts with less commercial backing. Yet the small-guys have much better ways to go about doing the same thing.

And what, exactly, do you have to do? Wait while Sonar boots up and does a scan of some folders. That differs from any other application how exactly? Oh I see. You can run the interface separately, and you can change some parameters. If you want.

Some 'stupid hoop'.

But still, I could go with the adapter and the hoop that comes with it as well, if it worked properly, but it doesn't work as well as the one offered natively in cubase.

Of the five or six hundred VST plugins Ive had installed, from freeware to SE plugins to high-end commercial stuff, the only ones which have ever been problematic have been Steinbergs. They seem to make them that way on purpose.

It's a waste of my time to maintain yet another cache of plugin information.

What 'cache of plugin information' do you have to 'maintain' exactly?

It's a huge frustration and adds to the complexity that we deal with all the time fighting with the machine instead of making music with it.

I feel you are grossly over-exaggerating here.

A better solution would be one that didn't require a system-level modification just to conform to the existing DirectX "fit" inside the Sonar programming.

Its not any kind of 'system level modification' at all.

Something internal to sonar itself, like FLstudio with it's excellent wrapper, would be much better IMO, where we would not have to do anything besides point to a directory containing our plugs (like nearly every other app with VST support) and then let the app recursively scan and we pick from the "all systems go" list.

The wrapper is internal to Sonar itself, and you do not have to do anything besides point to any number of directories containing your plugs and then let it scan.


As it stands, we have to run an external adapter.

No you do not. The GUI may be run externally, or it may run automatically.

What bothers me more is that as a side-effect I have no way to disable the presence of an adapted plugin within other direct-x aware apps -- for example I do not want soundforge scanning and detecting certain plug-ins that I don't use inside of soundforge, etc.
And I don't want to have to open the adapter and disable it before launching soundforge..

And you do have a way of disabling the presence of a VST plugin in other VST-aware applications than Cubase, do you? Or is that just a red herring.

Lackluster is when the WDM kernel streaming mode performs better than the ASIO mode even though my card has native ASIO support which is lower latency. Why is this?

I have no idea. ASIO performance has been better on both of the soundcards I have used.

I could not sort it out. I honestly change nothing on the card or in its settings, open cubase, and everything works fine. To me that experience is exactly lackluster; it works -- sorta.. mediocre performance. The ASIO mode in cubase works better for me on my system. Great performance.

Hmmm, I think I was right. 'Total fallacy' and 'Completely circumstantial' were indeed appropriate to your own post as well.

[grymmjack]

Hmmm, I think I was right. 'Total fallacy' and 'Completely circumstantial' were indeed appropriate to your own post as well.

Of course you are entitled to think what you like.